Long-term care in Sweden

The Swedish long-term care (LTC) system for frail and dependent old people is comprehensive in many respects. It offers good financial protection and covers a broad range of services is mainly funded through public sources and is staffed with a large number of care workers by OECD standards. Long-term care services are organised at local level, with municipalities purchasing care from both public and private providers, and many LTC recipients have the possibility of choosing across competing providers. There has been limited measurement, however, of the effectiveness and safety of care, and few mechanisms for guaranteeing standards of quality of the services of the type found in health care.